Jan Smid wrote:
Hi,
because I can better concentrate when reading a real piece of paper, I often print out several pages of my thesis to correct them manually and then transfer the corrections back into the lyx document. When doing this, it is a little bit annonying to orientate in the text on the screen because the screen view is totally different from the print version. Is it somehow configurable to let the text on screen appear a little bit more like the printed version?
I know that the typesetting is done by latex; but IMHO it should be possible to somehow "guess" how the document will probably look like.
This is something I believe you won't get. Sometimes, someone add a feature (like preview math and figures) that makes lyx more WYSIWYG. But you won't ever get the same line breaking on the screen as on paper, for several reasons:
1.The exact latex algorithm is way too slow for interactive use, because you really need to typeset the entire document for each keystroke if you want identical output. Anything less than that will be fraught with exceptions. If it cannot be done right - don't bother trying. Lyx derives lots of speed from _not_ even trying, and prettyness by _not_ limiting output quality to what can be rendered reasonably fast on screen. (The what you see is _all_ you get problem of other word processors.)
2.I believe this is also by design; a horizontal scrollbar isn't supposed to
be needed no matter how wide paper and small screen you have. And
a wide screen should not go to waste just because you're output is
going to be tiny columns.
3.Identical line breaking of paragraphs with plain text only could be done, although
in conflict with (2). But then you'd have to use the same font on screen as
on paper. That is surprisingly hard and surprisingly ugly due to the very
different resolutions of screen and paper. I'd rather have nice screen fonts
_and_ nice paper fonts and not worry about this.
4. There is no page breaking on screen so (3) is of limited value, particularly
as page breaks affect line breaking.
What you may get someday, is ability to click somewhere in the DVI viewer
and get transported to the same place in the text. The dvi output is identical
to paper output.
If you do lots of writing, consider getting a nice screen, such as a large flat panel.
They are nice to look at, I wrote a book and rarely used paper for review.
Helge Hafting.
